I Never Stopped Loving You
by ratti
Summary: An addition to the profic Q Squared- you don't have to have read the book to get it but its a really good book


Fanfic to the pro-fiction book, Q Squared. Really good book, I highly recommend it. Just a little P/C fluff. Nothing's mine, italics are from the book.

_Quick-thinking, Beverly grabbed a spray hypo and adjusted the dial, loading it with enough Somnol to tranquilize an army of berserk Jack Crushers. She approached them carefully, trying to slip in, not wanting to get the wrong man._

_With a triumphant yell, Jack viciously backhanded Picard, knocking him flat. He brought the phaser around, and then Beverly came at him with the hypo. He caught her wrist just before she was able to jam the hypo into him._

_Picard was on the floor, trying to clear his head. Crusher twisted Beverly's arm back she cried out in pain as she dropped the hypo. It clattered to the floor and Crusher kicked it away. Then he pulled her close and hissed in her ear, "You picked the wrong man." _

_Then he flung her away. Pumped up by anger and rage, he threw her as hard as he could against a medlab table. Beverly's legs got tangled up in each other and she tried to stop he fall. Her head struck the edge of the table with incredible force and there was a sharp **crack**…_

_Beverly hit the ground, her eyes still open in shock. For just a moment, just the briefest moment, there was a spark in her eyes, and she whispered, "I never stopped loving you…" And then she was gone._

"_Beverly." Picard could barely get her name out, and it was only at that hideous moment, in this insane shifting of universes, he realized he had no idea **which Beverly it was! **_

"_I'll be damned," said Jack Crusher. And then, matching action to words, he reversed his phaser and blew his own head off. _

_Sickbay was an appropriate place for Captain Jean-Luc Picard to be for, at that moment, he felt extremely sick. He had just seen Jack Crusher die… again. _

_And Beverly… Picard cradled her broken body in his lap. He said her name softly._

Just then he heard the sickbay doors open. He did not want to be disturbed right now. He turned around, getting ready to tell whoever it was to go away, and saw a very much alive Beverly. He looked quickly at the body in his arms and back at the woman in front of him. He even pinched himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming.

No, it was Beverly, but which one?

"Jean-Luc, what's goi- what the!" Beverly exclaimed.

"Is it you, my Beverly?" Picard asked. "All these multi-universes being switched, how do I know she isn't the Beverly of my universe?" he pointed at the lifeless body. "Tell me something about the Jean-Luc Picard you know."

"You are Captain of the U.S.S Enterprise. You and I are very good friends. We have breakfast together almost every day. You are a diplomat, not a fighting man if you can help it. You have little patience with children. You are my Jean-Luc," she responded gently. "What I want to know is what happened. I thought I heard Jack's voice and now he's dead. And apparently so am I. What happened?"

"Something must have been going on between Jack and this Beverly," Jean-Luc said shakily. "He was attacking her. He threw her across the room and she hit her had on the table. Seeing what he had done, he shot himself. Oh my God Beverly, I didn't know if it was you or… I was so scared."

Beverly gave him a hug, holding him tight. "I'm here, it's me. I'll never leave you. And I hope to God I never die like that," she added ruefully. Picard gave her a small smile. Then, with a look of determination, he gave her a small, chaste kiss on the lips.

"I was afraid I'd never see your smile in the morning. I was afraid I would never hear you laugh again. I was afraid I would never see you save another life. And I was so afraid I would never be able to tell you how much I love you."

Beverly just smile and returned the kiss. This one was the total opposite of chaste. It was passionate, full of the love they had kept from each other for years. When the need to breathe became too much, they parted. They smiled at each other, almost shyly.

"Well, this is new," Picard remarked.

"No, it's not," she replied. "We've been doing this dance for years. I fell in loved with you more than a decade ago. And to be perfectly honest, I never stopped loving you." Picard suppressed the shudder that came with that response. He pulled them up and they walked out the door together, towards the chaos Trelane had created. But this time they were together. They would never be apart again.


End file.
